Signage sought for gay man's meadow in SF

NEWS

by Matthew S. Bajko

John Mehring sits on a bench dedicated to the late Bill
Kraus overlooking Bill Kraus Meadow in Corona Heights Park. A plaque that has
been painted over can be seen on the back of the bench.(Photo: Rick Gerharter)

Visitors to Corona Heights Park, a hilltop open space
straddling San Francisco's gay Castro district and its famous Haight-Ashbury
neighborhood, on Saturday mornings back in the late 1970s and early 1980s were
likely to encounter a man seated on a bench with legal notepad in hand.

It was a weekly ritual for the late Bill Kraus, a gay man
and congressional aide who played a key role in transforming the city's growing
LGBT population into a political force. A Midwest transplant himself, Kraus
helped elect Harvey Milk as the city's first out supervisor in 1977.

He went on to work for gay Supervisor Harry Britt and later
Democratic Congress members Phillip and Sala Burton. Much of his strategizing
on behalf of his bosses' political agendas took place on that park bench,
recalled Ron Huberman, who was housemates with Kraus.

He and the late Dick Pabich, another up-and-coming gay
politico, would join their close friend each week at the park.

"We had a routine: almost every weekend we would meet for
coffee, in those days at Cafe Flore, then go up to Corona Heights Park where
Bill and Dick would brainstorm on political ideas," recalled Huberman, who
recently retired as an investigator with the district
attorney's office. "Phil made Bill his congressional administrative aide,
and in the meadow, he wrote most of Phil's speeches."

Kraus was instrumental in the local efforts to defeat the
anti-gay Briggs initiative in 1978. Shortly after Milk's assassination in
November of that year, Kraus was elected president of the progressive Harvey
Milk LGBT Democratic Club, renamed in honor of the slain gay rights leader.

He urged the Democratic Party to support gay rights as a
delegate and platform committee member at the national conventions in 1980 and
1984.

As AIDS began to ravage the city's gay male population in
the early 1980s, Kraus was a vocal proponent for closing the city's bathhouses
and urging safer sex practices. Following his own diagnosis in 1984, Kraus
moved to Paris to take part in an experimental AIDS drug study.

His "exile" from the U.S. garnered national media
attention about the glacial pace of the drug approval process in America. When
the medication he was taking was approved for trials in the states, Kraus
returned to San Francisco.

The late gay San Francisco Chronicle
reporter Randy Shilts would later chronicle Kraus's
role in the early days of the AIDS epidemic in his book And the Band
Played On. (Gay British actor Sir Ian
McKellan played Kraus in the 1993 HBO movie based on the book.)

Shortly before Christmas in 1985 Kraus contracted
meningitis, according to a news obituary in the Bay Area Reporter
. After six days in the hospital, Kraus died on
January 11, 1986 at the age of 38.

Immediately following his death, Kraus's friends sought to
rename the mini-park at Noe and Beaver streets, home to a community garden
across from Cafe Flore, in his honor. But city policy forbade changing the name
from one based geographically.

According to the minutes of the recreation and parks
commission's June 19, 1986 meeting, a committee comprised of representatives
for city leaders, parks officials, and neighborhood groups instead proposed
naming a meadow and path in Corona Heights Park after Kraus.

The commissioners unanimously adopted the idea, and sometime
afterwards, a bench with a plaque honoring Kraus was installed in the park.
Today, the plaque has been painted over and there is nothing indicating that
the Bill Kraus Meadow and Pathway exists.

The honor may have been lost to time had it not been for
schoolteacher John Mehring's memory being jogged. An acquaintance with Kraus
through his own involvement in the Milk club, Mehring turned 60 in February and
decided to re-read Shilts's book.

"In it he said that Bill would often go to Corona park
to reflect on his life," said Mehring, who was also diagnosed with AIDS in
1984 and active in the Milk club's safer-sex initiatives back then.

An Internet search led Mehring to the city's library stacks
to check out Michael T. Roper's 2001 book Memories of My Gay Brothers
. In it Roper writes about how the city had
memorialized Kraus by naming a meadow after him.

Mehring then visited the park but could find nothing
indicating where the meadow was located. Nor is it labeled on any online maps.

"I asked people, can you tell me where Bill Kraus
Meadow is. I talked to people who use the park and none knew about it,"
said Mehring.

He contacted the parks department, and a staffer was able to
locate the old meeting minutes. The meadow in question is a triangular shaped
patch of lawn at the park entrance on Museum Way and Roosevelt Way. The pathway
begins at that intersection and leads toward a fenced-in, off-leash dog play
area.

"There never has been any official signage placed
there, as far as I know," said Mehring, who is now pushing for the Kraus
meadow and pathway to be clearly labeled.

"This has been going on for years and we really need to
bring it to fruition," said Mehring. "It helps us reconnect with Bill
in a positive way."

The newly formed Friends of Corona Heights Park has agreed
to help with the project. It already had sought grant funding from the SF Parks
Alliance to install a bulletin board or kiosk in that section of the park.

The friends group is seeking $2,000 and would need to raise
another $3,000 in order to cover the full purchase price and installation
costs. The alliance will announce this year's grant recipients in late May.

"Certain members agreed to move forward together on
it," said Gill Sperlein, an attorney and representative of the friends
group.

Mehring hopes to see any identifying marker include a brief
bio about Kraus and his achievements.

"I want people to know Bill other than just a
name," he said. "In Randy's book is just one portrayal of him. He was
so passionate about safe sex. If it wasn't for him I don't know what our
initial response to the AIDS epidemic would have been. For that reason alone I
think we need to do more to remember him."

Huberman said he doesn't recall ever talking to Kraus about
having the meadow named after him, although, "the meadow was very
important to him."

After being contacted by Mehring recently, Huberman said he
is pleased to see an effort is being made to properly label that segment of the
park for his long lost friend.

"All this history we are going to lose as time goes
on," said Huberman. "I thought it was a huge deal naming something
for a gay man back then."